WP: Fakes "Vex" Market Development in China?

According to a July 12, 2004 article in the Washington Post, "Most counterfeits are sold on street corners from New York to Rome to people who know they're not real. But in recent years extremely high-quality fakes have become available. The same attributes that have enabled China to acquire wealth -- cheap labor and a swift assimilation of new manufacturing practices -- now menace the brands trying to capture it.
A media executive who splits her time between Beijing and Shanghai and earns about $80,000 a year said she no longer buys real handbags from major brands. "I realized that the quality of counterfeit stuff is not bad at all, and the price is one-tenth of the real products," said the executive, who gave her name as Ms. Gu. "I have never felt embarrassed to carry a fake. I have good taste, and I know what is high quality and what is in. . . . It is not as if I buy this bag just because of the brand. It has to be a style I like."